Continuous glass fiber strands, chopped strands, roving, cloth or mat can be used to reinforce thermosetting and/or thermoplastic matrix materials. Reinforced composites can be formed by pultrusion, filament winding, compression or injection molding and open lay-up molding such materials. These composites can be used in such applications as automobile components, boat hulls and fishing rods.
For reinforcing a resin matrix material, U.S. Pat. No. 3,713,962 discloses needled fibrous mats of unstranded glass filaments (column 2, lines 25-32) as a surfacing mat and a reinforcing mat of continuous glass fiber strands (column 4, lines 24-28) impregnated with a resin matrix material.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,580,646 discloses, at column 5, lines 10-21, a thermoplastic composite comprising at least two glass mats which comprise glass fiber strands selected from the group consisting of continuous glass fiber strands and chopped glass fiber strands and mixtures thereof wherein each glass mat is asymmetrically needled and wherein thermoplastic resin is placed between the glass mats.
In a conventional sheet molding compounding ("SMC") process, wound packages of roving are supplied to the process from a creel and chopped to provide reinforcement mat prior to being impregnated with a thermosetting matrix resin. There is a long-felt need in the industry to reduce or eliminate equipment, labor cost and physical space requirements associated with locating a roving supply system at the molding facility and provide a glass fiber product which has good uniformity and handling characteristics and which provides a composite having good physical and aesthetic properties.